Once and For All: An American Valor Novel by Cheryl Etchison Page B

noticed and raised a brow in interest.
    “Bree, this ugly guy here,” punctuating it with a slap to Ben’s chest, “is Ben Wojciechowski. Everyone calls him Soup. He and I’ve been in regiment together from the get-go. Ben, this is Bree Dunbar. MacGregor. My wife.”
    The smirk disappeared as Ben’s face turned serious. “I’m sorry. Did I hear that right? Did you say wife ?”
    “I did. We got married yesterday morning.”
    “Wow.” Ben took a moment to compose himself then extended a hand to Bree. “It’s very nice to meet you,” he said with complete sincerity. Then quickly added, “And only the a-holes in regiment call me Soup. Please, call me Ben.” Then he turned to face Danny, clapping his shoulder. “Congratulations, man! Clearly, your vacation was far more interesting than mine. All I’ve been doing for the past two weeks is peeling off a hundred years’ worth of wallpaper and working on the boys’ jump shots.”
    “Basketball?” Danny asked. “I thought they were doing wrestling.”
    “Ah, yes. The nice thing about basketball is it requires a ball and a hoop. Which makes that an outside sport in our house. Unlike wrestling, which can be done anywhere. Speaking of which—” Ben’s attention shifted to behind them. Danny and Bree turned to see those two little hell-raisers scrabbling on the ground, a twist of skinny arms and legs as boxes of cereal lay in carnage on the floor surrounding them.
    “Jesus Christ, guys! Come on! Just pick one so we can get the hell out of here.”
    Bree stifled a giggle. “They’re yours?” she asked.
    “Afraid so,” Ben said with a laugh. “Which reminds me, I’m supposed to buy a bottle of wine for the wife.”
    “Better make it two,” Danny added.
    “It was nice meeting you,” Ben said, pushing his shopping cart past them. “Hope to see you again soon.”
    Bree smiled. “Same here.”
    Ben gathered the boys, threw two kinds of cereal in the cart then gave a quick wave before disappearing around the corner at the opposite end.
    Her eyes met Danny’s and she shook her head in amazement. “Wow. I’m worn out from just watching them.”
    “I know, right?” He chuckled. “And that was good behavior for them. You should see those little terrors when they’re really going at it.”
    “No, thanks.”
    They headed back the way they came, Danny pushing the cart past refrigerated cases as Bree walked alongside him.
    “Why do they call him Soup?”
    He stopped and looked at her, a bit taken by surprise. Calling Ben by his nickname had become such a habit he’d never thought it might be considered odd by others. “When we were in RIP together . . .” Bree crinkled her brow in confusion and he suddenly remembered she didn’t know army lingo. “The Ranger Indoctrination Program,” he explained. “Basically, it was a month of hell to get into regiment. Anyhow, one of the instructors looked at his name and said ‘Your name has more fucking letters than my bowl of alphabet soup.’ ” Danny shrugged. “It stuck.”
    Instead of a slight chuckle or polite giggle, she laughed right out loud, the sound music to his ears.
    “You guys are weird.”
    He smiled back at her, unable to argue the point. Truth be told, she didn’t know the half of it. And if the day did come she found out about all the crazy shit they’d done over the past decade, she might very well want that divorce sooner rather than later.
    W HILE D ANNY RETRIEV ED the last few grocery bags from the car, Bree began putting things away. When his phone chimed the first time, she realized he’d left it sitting on the breakfast bar. Before she turned back around to finish what she was doing, it chimed a second time. Then a third. Clearly, someone was trying to get his attention. For the briefest of moments she considered taking a peek at his screen, but quickly reminded herself that would be an invasion of his privacy.
    “Your phone is going crazy,” she blurted out the moment he